


still left with the river

by screechfox



Category: The Magnus Archives (Podcast)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Ambiguous/Open Ending, Angst, Archivist Jonathan Sims, Background Lonely Eyes, Bittersweet Ending, Gen, Lonely!Jonathan Sims, Memory Loss, Season/Series 04
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-10-07
Updated: 2019-10-07
Packaged: 2020-11-27 00:00:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,687
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20938955
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/screechfox/pseuds/screechfox
Summary: It’s a cold August morning when Jon makes the offer, made all the colder by the skin-deep smile Peter gives him when he finishes talking.If Martin can make a deal with Peter Lukas, then Jon can make a better one.





	still left with the river

**Author's Note:**

> you ever start a fic that's meant to be one thing and then a month later you have a very different thing full of experimentation with word count constraints? oops
> 
> (ao3 counts words differently but i swear this was a nice round 3700 words on google docs)
> 
> title from _the boot theory_ by richard siken, because i am insufferably pretentious. the full line is: 
> 
> _A man takes his sadness down to the river and throws it in the river but then he’s still left with the river. A man takes his sadness and throws it away but then he’s still left with his hands._
> 
> :)

_ (It’s a cold August morning when Jon makes the offer, made all the colder by the skin-deep smile Peter gives him when he finishes talking. _

_ “You know, Elias wouldn’t approve of me poaching his Archivist,” Peter says, amiable as can be. _

_ “Elias isn’t here,” Jon snaps. “I am.” _

_ “What makes you think I’m even interested?” _

_ “You are,” Jon says with certainty. The knowledge pierces his brain like an icicle, but it’s there, just as immutable as any other knowledge the Eye has forced on him. “You need someone touched by the Eye for your plans. I qualify.” _

_ “You’ve been more than touched by the Eye, Jon. Even if I did take you up on your deal, I’m not sure my patron would be able to get a foothold on you.” _

_ For a long moment, Jon thinks about everything he knows about Peter Lukas — all those statements and recordings must be good for something. He forces himself to smile, a hard line that curves with resigned determination. _

_ “Are you willing to make a bet on that, Mr. Lukas?” _

_ Peter blinks, looking honestly startled. Then he laughs, holding out his hand. _

_ “I think we have a wager. Please, call me Peter.”) _

It isn’t long before Martin manages to find him; he catches Jon making tea in the breakroom a few days after Jon makes the deal. Jon should have expected that, if he’s honest, but Elias isn’t the only one guilty of underestimating Martin’s capabilities.

“What the hell did you do?”

It’s the first voice Jon has heard since Peter pushed him into Forsaken, and he startles, spilling boiling water across his hands. The scalding pain is too-vivid compared to the numbing chill of the foggy world around him, and Jon runs a finger over the patch of pink skin. It’ll heal.

When Jon turns around to look, Martin’s image is indistinct — overexposed, perhaps.

“You shouldn’t be here.” Jon tries to summon up annoyance, irritation, but all he can feel is a creeping tiredness that eats away at his thoughts like frostbite.

_ “You _ shouldn’t be here,” Martin counters. “What happened to letting me make my own choices?”

“You’re the only one allowed to sacrifice yourself on Peter Lukas’ sword, then?”

Martin stares at him, wide-eyed. He’s angry and indignant and so much more, the knowledge leaking through the fog in a wave of overstimulation. It’s all too intimate, and Jon can’t bear it.

“I’m already a monster, Martin. The least I can do is use that to save—” Jon swallows. _ Isolation, not communication, _ he reminds himself. This is what he chose. For Martin’s sake. “I have to go.”

“No.”

“Martin, I _ have to go.” _

“Jon, you don’t get to do that.”

“Why not?”

“It was meant to be me.”

“Well, now it isn’t.” Martin flinches at the factual tone of Jon’s voice. An icy stream of guilt trickles down Jon’s back, insidious and painful and— welcome, in its way. It’s a reminder that Jon deserves this more than Martin ever did, and it doesn’t matter whether it’s his own regret or something the Lonely is pulling to the surface. Probably a little of both.

“Jon, _ please. _ I’ll talk to Peter, just— don’t do this.”

“You’re not going to talk to Peter,” Jon says, calm settling over him. “You know what you’re going to do?”

It’s hard to tell through how faded Martin’s image is, but Jon thinks he might be crying.

“You’re going to _ live.” _ Then, because Jon knows it’ll hurt both of them, he adds, “and you’re going to do it without me.”

Anger suits Martin, Jon thinks distantly. It fills the soft lines of his face with steely purpose, even as his cheeks flush and his eyes are wet. Jon watches Martin consider the situation, watches him ball his hands into fists. For a moment, Jon even thinks Martin is going to punch him.

Then all at once, all that fury falls away. Martin sags. There are ice crystals forming on his skin.

“Jon, _ please,” _ Martin says again, utterly hopeless.

“I’m sorry, Martin. It has to be me.”

Jon pulls the fog in close around himself, and then he’s alone. It shouldn’t be this much of a relief.

_ (“I’m impressed,” Peter says, next time he deigns to grace Jon with his presence. It could be hours later, or it could be weeks. Time isn’t easy to track in the grips of the Lonely — one more disconnect from normal people. “I truly thought you’d trip up at the first hurdle.” _

_ “What are you talking about?” Jon’s lips are numb with cold, stumbling over the words. _

_ Peter’s hand reaches to Jon’s cheek, brushing rough fingers across rough stubble. _

_ “You need a shave, Archivist.” _

_ “Peter.” _

_ Peter smiles, genial and hollow. _

_ “I’m talking about Martin,” he says, in the tone of someone giving a child the basic facts about the universe. “You’ve forgotten already?” _

_ Jon hadn't thought he could get any colder. _

_ “Oh, well,” Peter continues, pressing a thumb to the sharp angle of Jon’s cheekbone. “I don’t suppose it matters much anymore. I doubt he’ll make another attempt at looking for you.” _

_ “What happened?” Jon asks, and for all the intent he tries to give the words, they’re flat and empty on his tongue. _

_ “You drove him away.” The pride in Peter’s voice is awful. Jon laughs a bitter-chill laugh. _

_ “I’ve always been— very good at making people feel unwanted.”) _

Jon still spends most of his days in the Archives, living out his familiar routines as best he can. He even manages to record some statements, though his lips are frost-chapped and his voice hoarse from disuse. What happens to the tapes after he’s done, he isn’t quite sure.

Outside the walls of the Institute, London is all fog and freezing winds. Jon is under no illusions that staying in the Archives will save him, but within their walls, he feels… more like himself. It’s as though the dark-wood shelves of stories help to patch over the ever-growing gaps in Jon’s memories. They don’t replace what he’s lost, of course, but he clings to that small comfort.

Eventually, of course, Jon gets restless.

Though there are no passengers visible to him, the Underground still comes like clockwork. He picks a random train, fuelled by desperation to be somewhere else for a while. 

He wishes he could say he’s surprised when _ somewhere else _ turns out to involve a sobbing stranger whose loneliness is so thick in the air that Jon can’t breathe. It’s strangely beautiful in a way he’d never considered before, like a quiet winter’s morning after first snowfall.

This man— his voice is on tape, but his statement was never given, not properly.

“Mr. Finlinson,” Jon calls, voice low, and relishes the crisp taste of Brian’s startle.

“I—” Brian stares at him, eyes wide with disbelief, and perhaps a hint of hope. He’s faded at the edges, barely more substantial than the mist that surrounds him.

“Would you like to tell me what happened to you?”

After a year in Forsaken, Brian has no defenses left. Another moment of panicked stammering, and then the words begin to spill from his mouth. Jon exhales in relief; his breath stubbornly refuses to fog in the air. He’s so very cold, but he feels… better. He hadn’t realised how hungry he was until now, unable to distinguish one tired ache from another.

Perhaps Brian feels better too. Colour is seeping back into him, until he’s almost too vivid to look at. It’s as though the simple act of recounting the story is restoring what the Lonely has eaten away from him. When Brian finishes speaking, Jon thanks him. It’s an old habit at this point; a simple kindness that makes Brian look so _ happy. _

“Who _ are _ you?” Brian asks like a prayer.

Jon looks at him, and thinks about what he has to do, and makes a choice.

In the detached contentment that always follows a live statement, it’s easy enough to look at Brian with an expression of polite disinterest. For all that Brian is revitalised, he has no more stories for Jon to pull out of him. The Lonely can eat away at him once more.

Besides, it isn’t as though Jon could do anything for Brian, even if he wanted to.

“That doesn’t matter. I’m about to leave, and you aren’t ever going to see a living soul again.”

_ (“How does it feel?” Peter asks, and he sounds honestly curious — as though the idea of feeling anything about casual psychological torture is novel to him. _

_ He places a hand against Jon’s chest as Jon’s breathing quickens. Jon should flinch away, but there’s no connection in Peter’s touch, just the hollow bones of a creature that never stops to land. It calls to where Jon’s heart is being carved out of him, bit by bit. _

_ “Awful, and— wonderful,” Jon admits, and his voice sounds very small. He still feels ice in his veins, pumping glacier-slow, but it lacks the fragility that it once had. _

_ Peter makes a sound of acknowledgement, smoothing over the creases of Jon’s shirt. _

_ “That’s how it goes, so I’ve been told.” _

_ “So you’ve been told? What—” Jon is silenced by Peter’s hand moving to his mouth. Peter doesn’t look anything more than mildly irritated. _

_ “A statement wasn’t part of our deal, was it?” _

_ “We can always change the deal,” Jon says, when Peter lets go. _

_ “Do you have anything else to offer me?” Peter waits a moment, then smiles indulgently. “As I thought. Ask again, and I’ll let Forsaken steal the voice from your throat.”) _

There’s no great ceremony when Jon is pulled from the Lonely. One moment he is making himself a cup of tea — cold, always cold — and the next moment, the world is full of colour and noise. He drops his mug, and the sound of it shattering on the floor makes him flinch.

“Excellent,” says a voice so full of warm emotion that it’s utterly alien. It’s Elias, of course. Who else would it be? “Just in the nick of time, I suspect.”

It’s strange, the things you forget. Elias’ physicality is unfamiliar, beyond the vague recollections that he’s always been the type to wear fitted suits and a self-satisfied grin. But Jon remembers the _ feeling _ of Elias, iron-sharp thoughts and cruel clarity; an anchor that Jon has never wanted but always been given. Jon tries to avert his gaze, desperate for quiet and solitude.

There are other people scattered about the room, watching him with wide, suspicious eyes.

“What did you do?” Jon asks Elias, desperate.

Elias is hideously smug, and Jon hates him for it. At least Peter has the decency not to _ smirk. _

“You seem to have continued difficulties with self-restraint, Jon.”

“I— I made a choice.”

“And while I’m glad you finally understand the importance of your own decisions, this was a path of self-destruction I couldn’t allow you to continue on.”

Jon sighs. He wants anger, but anger is so far away. Against the palette of reality, he feels dull, washed out. He reaches for the hollow comfort of a world as faded as he is, and finds— nothing. The _ wrong _ nothing, an absence more physical than emotional. A limb torn away.

All through this, Elias’ gaze remains as piercing as ever, pinning Jon in place. 

“Oh,” Jon says, empty-voiced. 

It’s ironic; he finds himself feeling lonelier than ever.

Elias brushes a gentle hand across the thawing ice on Jon’s skin. It’s all at once too much, and Jon finds himself letting out a quiet sob. One of the strangers steps forward, a look of concern on the soft lines of his face.

“Jon?” When Jon doesn’t respond, the man’s expression turns angry. It suits him, Jon thinks distantly, though he can’t say why. “Elias, let him go.”

Elias raises his eyebrows with distinct amusement. He moves to pull his hand away, and some terrified, animal part of Jon reaches up and holds him in place. Elias’ touch is like pins and needles, the return of sensations Jon had long resigned himself to missing. 

“Nonsense,” Elias says as an aside. “Attachment is a valuable weapon against the Lonely.”

“Forsaken _ loves _ attachment.” Jon mutters. “It carves it out of you, and it hurts like hell.”

“Well. Quite.”

If Jon tried, he’d be able to find dry facts about each member of their judgemental audience — names, ages, and so on. Out here, he has access to anything the Eye is willing to give him. He sighs, cold breath against Elias’ palm. It’s easier to forget.

_ (“Honestly, I’m just annoyed with Elias,” Peter says. _

_ “I know the feeling,” Jon mutters, taking a sip of tea and staring at the mess of statements in front of him. “Believe me, I had nothing to do with this development.” _

_ “That’s not strictly true, but I understand why you’d think that.” _

_ Peter leans against Jon’s desk, plucking the tea from his hands. When he gives it back, it’s ice cold, and Jon tries to pretend that’s not a relief. _

_ “On the other hand, this doesn’t actually change anything,” Peter continues. “It’s inconvenient, obviously, but it’s hardly the disaster that Elias would prefer it to be.” _

_ “Is this the point where I finally get to learn what the plan is?” _

_ Peter’s expression turns thoroughly noncommittal, and he shrugs. _

_ “I’ve been having to adapt some of the finer details since we made our arrangement, but if all goes well, everything will be ready soon.” _

_ “And until then? Am I trapped here?” _

_ “I’ve spoken to Elias about it,” sighs Peter. “His exact words were ‘until the winter comes’.” _

_ Jon considers making some dry comment about mythology — Persephone feels apt — but his heart isn’t in it. His heart isn’t anywhere, these days.) _

“You don’t remember, do you?”

Jon’s gaze flickers up for long enough to see who’s speaking. It’s the man who’d spoken to Elias on Jon’s unhappy return. He looks resigned, Jon thinks. All that worried fury has been washed away into something much more manageable. Sad is the word — such a simple word, but the only one that fits, small and beautiful and on the edge of collapse.

Jon looks back at the papers in front of him, and waits. He’s hardly obliged to answer every question directed at him, especially not when it was such a broad query.

“I mean, before you joined up with Peter, you were— you were _ desperate _ for my attention.” There’s a pause, then a noise that’s half-laugh, half-sigh. “That’s your cue to tell me I was the same, I suppose.” Another pause, heartbreak thick in the air. “Right. Of course not.”

Jon looks up again. The unfamiliar man looks on the verge of crying, eyes wet and cheeks flushed, but his expression is unrelentingly stoic.

“So— So you don’t remember me, and that’s _ fine.” _

“Yes. Yes, it is.”

“I— Right.” The man laughs again, hollow in a way that resonates with Jon. “Do you even remember _ why _ you made a deal with Peter?”

“The Extinction,” Jon says, irritation filling each syllable with disdain.

There’s a moment where it looks like the stranger is going to say something — his head tilts upwards and there’s a defiant gleam in the damp shine of his eyes. Then there’s a cool breeze through the room, and he sags in something like defeat.

“The Extinction,” he agrees.

Jon feels a smile tug on his lips, pleasure in the palpable hopelessness of the air. This interaction hasn’t been a _ complete _ waste of time. He turns his attention back to the piles of statements, discarding the false ones without even looking at them.

The man doesn’t leave. He watches, his stare making Jon’s skin itch.

“You’re not even curious, are you?” There’s a muted horror to that voice now, wide-eyed and lip-bitten. The man has gone very pale; he almost resembles a Lukas.

“Is there something I _ should _ be curious about?”

_ “Everything. _ Jon, you—” Now he seems to be getting angry again, running a hand through the mess of his hair. “Christ, what did the Lonely do to you?” 

Jon doesn’t answer. He doesn’t have to.

“Do you…” The man laughs another hollow, bitter laugh. “Do you want some tea?”

Jon considers the question, lip curling in distaste.

“I’m perfectly capable of making my own tea. I doubt you’d make it the right way anyway.”

The man’s lips quirk with a wry sadness, and he mutters something about nostalgia. Then he sighs, stepping away.

“I’ll get you some tea,” he says decisively.

The man hovers at the door. He shivers at another cool breeze, but manages to hold his ground.

“I’m Martin. Since you don’t remember.”

Jon tells himself he doesn’t care, but he files the name away anyway.

_ (There’s an absence on one of Peter’s fingers — a thin line of pallor against Peter’s already white skin. So much of Peter is absence that it takes Jon a moment to notice the change. When Peter catches Jon looking, he laughs, twisting his fingers over the space like a ring. _

_ “Elias always has to go the extra mile when he’s unhappy.” _

_ This, of all things, makes Jon curious. It’s just so odd. _

_ “You’re married.” _

_ “Not anymore,” Peter says, cheerful as the risen sun. _

_ “How?” _

_ Peter grins, and Jon knows he’s about to be ignored. The sharp, inquisitive annoyance is a good feeling, and Jon grasps at it despite its heat. _

_ “I’ve finished preparing the plan. I’m ready to go whenever you are.” _

_ “Ready to go where?” _

_ Peter raises his eyebrows, amused and not hiding it. _

_ “You haven’t figured it out? You’re grand, Jon, but sometimes I wonder why Elias picked you.” _

_ Jon feels himself flush, warm and angry. Peter’s eyebrows raise higher, and Jon forces himself to calm. _

_ “The tunnels,” he says dully. Where the information came from, he isn’t sure. The Eye, the statements, his own faulty memory; it doesn’t matter. _

_ “Like I said. Ready when you are.”) _

Jon has only taken a few steps into the tunnels when he feels the sensation of being watched. It’s not a surprise, even when he turns around to see Elias standing there. Elias is incongruous in the dusty dark, the hems of his trouser-legs coated in dirt. His eyes are stark and shining.

“Going somewhere?”

“Are you planning to stop me?” Jon asks in turn.

Elias sighs. There’s disappointment in his expression, but for once, it seems to be directed inwards, pooling in the grey-tinged bags under his eyes.

“No,” Elias admits. It should make Jon pleased. It doesn’t. 

He turns on his heel to continue down the tunnels, but the feeling of Elias’ eyes on his back is so distracting that he only manages another few steps. Jon huffs, irritated.

“Did you want something, Elias?”

“I want to see everything, forever,” Elias murmurs. “Forsaken dulled your edges, but I think we still share that hunger. The bone-deep need to _ know.” _

“... Peter isn’t the only one with plans for whatever is at the centre of these tunnels, is he?”

“Exactly.”

Jon pauses to consider the implications. They make his blood run cold; it is and isn’t a comfort.

“I made this arrangement to _ stop _ the apocalypse, not to start it.”

“No, you didn’t. But it’ll do no good telling you otherwise.” Elias sighs again. “Forsaken is seductive. Even, apparently, to you.”

“You were married to Peter,” Jon says without thinking, and is surprised by the fog of loneliness that rises from Elias’s skin at those words. It makes Elias seem so human, utterly emotional.

_ “Were,” _ Elias emphasises, as though his heart isn’t cracked down the middle.

“You— _ divorced _ because of me.”

“The other man.” Elias’ teeth glimmer in the darkness as he smiles. “Peter Lukas is hardly a great loss. Don’t fret over my unhappiness when there are far more pressing matters.”

Elias takes one step forward. Jon tries to match the distance, but his back hits the tunnel wall with a muted thud.

“I won’t tell you what to do, Jon.”

“That makes a change.”

Elias’ smile widens, that tempered pride that has always made Jon’s stomach twist.

“I worried you’d lose that attitude. The Lonely’s servants are so often apathetic, and most don’t bother to pretend otherwise. I’m glad to see that you’re as abrasive as always.”

“There’s hope for me yet?” Jon aims for disdain, but it comes out tired and wry. There is no answer Elias could give that would be a comfort to him.

“That’s up to you.”

Jon wavers on his feet. His heart feels strange in his chest, beating too fast and leaving him breathless. Mist coils around his legs, shackles of possessive cold. Elias’ eyes wide and bright and ever-curious. He’ll watch Jon to his doom.

“I have to go. Alone,” Jon says, distantly regretful. 

“I know.” Elias nods. He leans forward and presses a kiss to Jon’s forehead. His lips are rough. “I trust you, Jon. You’ll do what you must.”

_ (Peter isn’t here. There’s just the numbing breeze, guiding Jon where he needs to go.) _

Jon sees.

A chamber that is almost a cathedral; perfectly circular, the pupil of a stone and staring eye.

The glint of mirrors. A thousand fractured iterations of himself, all of them achingly hungry.

The reflections in the mirrors shift, show him fear. There is _ so much _ fear. 

Jon _ sees. _

_ (In hindsight, Peter should never have made such a bold wager in the first place.) _

Jon is bitterly cold, utterly alone, but he is content watching the world go by.

_ (Details on the Extinction arrive shortly, along with a firm request that Peter Lukas leave.) _

“Neatly done,” Elias says. A CCTV camera turns to him so Jon can get a better angle. “Are you enjoying the view?”

There’s no answer. Elias hums.

“There’s something addictive about having so many eyes, isn’t there?”

Elias makes eye contact with his reflection — and thus, with Jon. It’s piercingly intimate, and Jon feels abruptly aware of his body. It hurts, rusted, an obsolete mechanism in a machine built for only watching.

“I’d planned better for you, Jon. If— _ When _ you get tired of being alone… I’ll be here.”

**Author's Note:**

> **:)**
> 
> i wouldn't have written this fic without [ways to save the world](https://archiveofourown.org/works/19275127) by wildehack, which is fantastic and comparatively uplifting compared to this angsty monster i have created, so if you haven't read that, i definitely recommend it!
> 
> as always, you can find me on tumblr at [screechfoxes](http://screechfoxes.tumblr.com). i hope you have a good day!


End file.
